Jiro Dreams of Sushi (Flick’s Review)

Posted on | May 18, 2012 | Add Comments

Jiro Ono ran away when he was nine years old. Now he’s over eighty years of age. He’s now been making sushi for over seventy years. This documentary features interviews with Jiro, his two sons, a food critic, and more.
Jiro is a perfectionist. Interviewees in the film say so themselves. The film might not be perfect but it’s still great. Anybody who likes sushi or who wants to learn about the greatest living sushi chef. If you’re not interested in learning about either one, you won’t have as much fun.

One of the great things about the film is that it shows the sushi. We see the sushi (in focus)get placed on a plate. The background (out of focus) is the kitchen. David Gleb, the director of the movie watered my mouth, fulfilled my curiosity, and filmed it all with intensity that is leagues ahead from your average modern action movie. For anybody hoping to watch an intoxicatingly gripping documentary, this is for you. The interviews reveal much about Jiro: his childhood, his love of sushi, his sons, and how to massage an octopus for forty minutes.The music is dramatic and gives life to Jiro and his apprentices.The one criticism I have is that towards the end, the film got repetitive and I almost felt as if I was about to watch what I had already watched. But fortunately, Gleb serves us a delicious ending… And it’s right out of the oven.

My favorite character is Jiro because of his expansive knowledge of sushi.

My favorite scene is the end because it wraps everythting up and saves the film from being repetitive.

Jiro Dreams of Sushi is rated PG but there is just about nothing inappropriate. The film is however, slow and younger kids may get bored easily.

A wonderful documentary; full of interesting facts and dramatic music. Best of all is Jiro is there in the center of it all.

Category: documentary, in theaters, posts by flick

Aliens of the Deep (Flick’s Review)

Posted on | April 2, 2012 | Add Comments

4 stars

James Cameron, Marine and Astrobiologists and more travel 2 1/2 miles below the surface of the ocean. They encounter alien-like sea creatures and test scientific experiments.

The man that made the two of the highest grossing films of all time, Avatar and Titanic (both beaten only by Gone with the Wind) is also fascinated by the depths of the ocean. In 2003, he made the film Ghosts of the Abyss where he and Bill Paxton, an actor in Titanic traveled to the sunken ship itself. Then, in 2005, he directed Aliens of the Deep. It’s no wonder that James Cameron shows off his knack for visuals; while this film is a documentary Cameron does show off his talent, and that’s fine with me, as long as it doesn’t get in the way of the documentary aspect of the film. Fortunately, it doesn’t. The creatures in the film are fascinatingly shown off in scenes that give us great cinematography and teach us interesting new things. It’s obvious that Cameron has talent, and he displays it, here but not in the way he did in Avatar. Here we actually learn something.

Cameron himself says, “Here’s the deal. I love this stuff.” That is completely evident here. I learned many new things that I didn’t know before. Absolutely nothing in the film is complicated (no brain work today buster!) but that’s not the point. Cameron is much more interested in trying to interest his audience. He does, brilliantly. aliensofthedeep The film is basically two short films: the first half focuses more on the wonder and spectacle of the deep sea animals, while the second half focuses more on how Cameron and his crew traveled, explored and researched the deep sea. This is why the movie works well. Cameron doesn’t let his knowledge fall into a mess. No, no, he keeps everything organized. The whole film is organized. So perfectly. That’s actually my problem with the film: it’s so perfect. Only once do we see a failure with the crew. It would have been nice to see some more faults that occurred during the journey and that’s the problem with Cameron, he doesn’t want to show his mistakes or faults. A perfectionist as they call ‘em, a perfectionist.

My favorite character (explorer) was Dijanna Figueroa because she was (like so many of the other explorers) clearly interested in doing what she was doing.

My favorite scene was when James Cameron and some other divers saw the squid because it summed up the spectacle aspect of the film and the creature looked unique.

Aliens of the Deep is rated G and I agree.

Aliens of the Deep is almost perfect, it’s a hugely rewarding experience; you’ll come out of the theater or your living room or where ever and you’ll wish you’d never come out. This is James Cameron at his best.

Category: 3-D, adventure, documentary, posts by flick, reviews

Pina (Flick’s Review)

Posted on | March 30, 2012 | 2 Comments

4 1/2 stars

Pina Bausch, a dancer and dance choreographer died in 2009. Her students pay tribute to her.

Pina is a tribute to Pina Bausch and it features nonstop dancing. That is all you need to know before going to see the film. If that is all you want to know before seeing the film, stop reading now. However, there’s no way to “spoil” the movie because after all it is nonstop dancing interspersed with Bausch’s students describing her. Helene Louvat, the film’s cinematographer uses the camera in an indescribable way. In all the movies I’ve seen, I’ve never seen anybody use a camera like this; Louvart is an important part of why the film works. Her use of the camera is stunning. Also the music, by various artists that include Thom Hanreich and Jon Miyake (the writer of the best track in the film, Lillies of the Valley) is catchy and jazzy, the perfect paring for a beautifully shot tribute to Bausch. A problem in many films these days is the length. At 103 minutes, Pina moves along quickly and rightly so; Wim Wenders’ film could get tiring after a while because the dancing is so mesmerizing.I didn’t see the film in 3-D, but I think that would add another layer to the film. That leads me to my next compliment of the film. The dancers in this film are amazing. However it’s obvious that Wenders adds another layer to the dancing. The dancing + the cinematography + the score + the costumes (which I haven’t mentioned, but are very good) = a cinematic delight. Wenders uses everything to make the dances more exciting, more vivid, more real. He brings a boulder, chairs, water and (best of all) a red jacket to life on the big screen.

My favorite character (dancer) is Pina Bausch because almost all of the dancers described her and yet so much was left unsaid, especially how she died making for an interesting portrait of her.

My favorite scene is the second scene in the film with the brown dirt, women, men and the woman with the red jacket because the use of color was so effective and the dance was very well done.

Pina is rated PG for some sensuality/partial nudity and smoking, however it’s is appropriate for almost anybody (whether or not they’ll sit through it is a different matter).

Pina is provocative, full of color and a must see for any fan of cinema.

Category: 3-D, documentary, new releases, posts by flick, reviews